We spent our first anniversary at Walt Disney World. We were there from September 18-24, 2002. This vacation had been in the planning stages since February of 2001! It was well worth the wait!

Day One: Arrival and Epcot
We woke up at 5:00am to make our 7:30 CST flight to Orlando. We spent the night at Tony's parents' house, who live closer to the airport than we do. We left the house by 6:00am and were at DFW by 6:30. This was both of our first time flying after 9/11 and we weren’t sure what to expect. Check in was a breeze and we ended up with a lot of time to wait. Security did search my backpack and thanked me for packing rounded tip instead of pointed scissors, which they would have had to confiscate. We had pizza for breakfast at the terminal while we waited.

Tony was assigned to an isle and I had a middle seat. After we took off we realized that no one had the window seat, so we got to spread out and enjoy our flight. Neither of us could sleep the night before from excitement and we were both tired and took naps. We landed early and were on the ground by 10:45 EST. MCO is a cool airport, one of the prettiest I’ve seen, and we both like taking the train to the main building.

Rabbit, our town car chauffeur, was waiting at the bottom of the escalator with my name on a pink sign, just as he said he would be. He waited with us at baggage claim, took our bags to the car and loaded it up for us. We got to ride in the new Excursion. Tony rode in the front seat (he doesn’t like to feel like he is being chauffeured) while I lounged in the back. We stopped at a neighborhood Publix and picked up our groceries for the week. Then it was off to Disneyworld!

Driving through the gates is the coolest thing ever. You totally leave the real world. We headed to our resort, Port Orleans Riverside. Rabbit gave our bags to luggage services and we headed inside to check in. Check in was easy, there was hardly no wait at 12:30 on a Wednesday. Our first stop was the food court for some lunch. The food court is pretty cool, the food is average for a food court and the prices are Disney, but we were satisfied. After we were done, a guy from bell services loaded up a golf cart with our things and drove us to our room.

The beauty of this resort cannot be done justice by pictures. It is just too cool. We were in Magnolia Terrace room 8767. It is on the second floor inside the courtyard with a river view. We got a king room. The room was nothing stellar, but very adequate for the price. We unpacked and headed to the east depot (which was right behind our building). We were off to Epcot.

I’ll stop right here and say that both of us were immensely impressed with Disney transportation. We used the bus stop at our resort to get everywhere, and never waited more than 15 minutes. The busses were clean, the drivers friendly and everything flowed so smoothly. The busses drop you off and pick you up at the entrances of the parks so you don’t have to walk through the mammoth Disney parking lots. At park closings, the waits were longer, but that was understandable. My advice is not to rush out of the parks to get a bus, but to linger around, continue to enjoy the sights and the shops until the lines have died down. I think there is no need to rent a car at Disney, unless you are in an extreme hurry and can’t wait 10-15 minutes for a bus to come.

Okay, back to Day 1. We arrived at Epcot and were ready for the magic to begin. We asked the CM (cast member, Disney employee) to take a picture of us in front of Spaceship Earth (or, as laymen call is, the big golf ball). Then we made that our first stop. Because it was September, there were absolutely NO LINES. We walked right on to everything. In this case, we were the only ones in our car. This ride is ok, it’s not the most exciting thing to me. And I don’t know if this is normal, but our car kept stopping, it did at al least 4 times. After Spaceship Earth, we went to Global Neighborhood and called Tony’s mom on the giant phone. That was cool! Though, she immediately thought something was wrong cause we were calling collect on the first day of our trip. After that was headed to Innoventions. This was also just ok to me, both of us said it felt like a big (slightly outdated) commercial, but it was still entertaining. We tried to send a video email to Tony’s dad, but he said he couldn’t figure out how to open it. We did the Ellen show, which I think would have held a bigger wow factor for me if I was younger. It was still funny and entertaining though. I loved the huge screens. And the moving seats were very cool.

After spending a few hours in Innoventions, we headed for Test Track. There was about a 15-minute wait here. This ride is really cool, even though the track stopped halfway through for “Technical difficulties” that kind of took some of the excitement out of it, but luckily it stopped before the “good” part.

Now it was getting toward evening and we headed to World Showcase. WS is made up of 10 areas themed like countries around the world. It is really cool. The people who work in each of the “countries” are actually from that country (we know, we asked). We spent some time mulling around and trying to figure out where to go for dinner. Tony wanted to go to Mexico. I said “We live in Texas and eat Mexican all the time, I don’t want that here in WDW!” So, we ended up going to Japan and dinner was very good. We didn’t do any more attractions that night, but we walked around and explored the countries. I had a funnel cake (I LOVE those things). We watched the Tapestry of Dreams Parade and then Illuminations. Illuminations is really cool, it’s a fireworks and light show that celebrates the cultures of the world. We had a really good viewing spot right in front of Italy. Then, we headed back to the busses and home to our resort.

Day Two: More Epcot and Downtown Disney
We woke up at 7am and were at the bus stop a little before 9. We had breakfast (bagels and cereal) in our room each day and we think that saved us time and money. We headed to Epcot to finish up the things we hadn’t seen. When we got there, the character caravan was there! We got pictures with Baloo, Mickey and Minnie. We went to the Living Seas first. Now, I don’t think we did this correctly. When you enter this ride, and you get the choice of going straight down or taking the tour, we chose to go straight down and ended up missing the “ride.” It was no biggie, cause we still got to see that tank, which is just immense! It is the largest saltwater tank in the world (or, at least in North America!) We spent lots of time just marveling at the sea life and watching the dolphins.

After the Living Seas we did Body Wars and The Making of Me (very well done, but unless you have had “the talk” I wouldn’t take my kids here). We crossed back over to see Journey into Your Imagination (cute and fun, but pretty “kiddy”) and Honey I Shrunk the Audience. That was one of my top attractions for the whole trip. I can still feel those mice crawling up my legs!!

We headed to Germany for lunch at the Beirgarten. This was also a highlight of the trip. The food was great at a good price. I didn’t think I would like the community seating, but we sat with some really great people and had good conversations. We did another tour of the countries; we went on the boat ride at Mexico and saw The American Adventure Show as well as visited more of the pavilions. By then we were ready to head out of Epcot. By the time we got to the front it started to rain. Tony convinced me to buy Leave a Legacy tiles. I didn’t want spend the money on it at first, but now I am glad I did. We got two tiles, one with our picture and one with a message. By the time we were done, the rain began to subside. We headed for the monorail to ride the circuit and tour the resorts. It was Tony’s first monorail ride and I asked if we could ride in front. We got to ride with the pilot and even got our co-pilot license. What a great first monorail ride for him! We got off at the TTC (ticket and transportation center) and transferred to the resort monorail. We enjoyed riding the circuit and got off at the Contemporary. It started to rain again and we headed to the California grill to enjoy the view. It was about 5pm and we got a great window seat while we had drinks. The view is awesome, even in the rain. You can see the whole “world” from there!

After that, we headed to the boat launch to go see the Wilderness Lodge. This resort is just breathtaking. If our budget had been a little bigger, we would have stayed here. It is totally our style. While we were walking around it, we almost talked ourselves into transferring there for the rest of our stay (I am glad we didn’t though, I don’t think it would have been worth the money). We took the bus from the Wilderness Lodge to Downtown Disney. We waited at this bust stop a little over 30 minutes, our longest wait of the trip (another reason I am glad we didn’t transfer to that resort).

We mulled around the shops at Downtown Disney and scoped out what we would buy when we came back on our last day. Downtown Disney is a really cool place, and I think it is underrated as an attraction. I wished we had planned more time there. We went to Planet Hollywood for dinner, which was not smart. The service was slow and the food was terribly mediocre.

After that, we headed to Pleasure Island. It was still early so none of the clubs were full. That, and it was a Thursday night. Now, I noticed some kids walking around. While kids are admitted to the island and into a few of the clubs, I would not bring my kids here. It is adult themed and a lot of the locals come here to go clubbing. It’s not at all a place for kids in my opinion. We popped our head in each of the clubs. It was too early for the dance clubs to be exciting so we headed for the jazz club and sat in for a set. This was a really mellow experience if you like that sort of thing (which I do). We then went to the Adventurers Club. Kungaloosh!! I don’t know how to explain this place to those who haven’t been. It’s kind of like a murder mystery where you step into and take part in a totally themed setting, but it wasn’t a murder mystery. The setting is 1937 and everyone is totally in character and the masks on the wall can see you and talk to you. In the center of the main room is Fly Fishing Zeus (a statue). Zeus is not anatomically correct and Babylonia (a mask on the wall) asked me to “complete” him. In front of off those people I stoof up and attached his “missing parts.” Great fun, lots of laughs but not for kids.

After that we were pooped. We headed to the boat dock and took the boat ride back to our resort. We really enjoyed having the boat to Downtown Disney right at our resort.

Day Three: Disney-MGM Studios
We wanted to wake up about 7am, but didn’t really get up and going until 8:30 or so. And to top it off, we noticed that I had lost my sunglasses, so we headed over to POR’s gift shop to buy sunglasses for me (plus a cool Mickey visor for me and a Grumpy hat for Tony.) We didn’t get to MGM at opening, but around 10:30. I know that MGM has lots of shows, so I wanted to get a schedule and coordinate the shows before we got started. The next Indiana Jones wasn’t for a while, so we went to Drew Carey’s Sounds Dangerous. Kind of cool, but not a “must do.” I think it would be more enjoyable for adults than kids. As we were standing up to leave, Tony’s clip on sunglasses got caught on the seat and snapped in half. Oh no! Wait, a minute, we are at Disney, right? Just as soon as we excited the theater, we spot a sunglass cart, and lo’ and behold, there were clip ons that fit his glasses. So, we were all set.

Indiana Jones was next. I was looking forward to it; Tony thought it would be cheesy. It ended up being great! One of the highlights of the trips. A definite must see, in my opinion. From there, it was just about lunchtime, so we headed to the Sci Fi. The atmosphere here is really cool, but the food and service were very mediocre. The atmosphere kept us happy, because the food definitely didn’t. Next was Star Tours, which was fun, and then Muppet Vision 3D. I must admit to catching a few Zzzz’s during the show (hey, it was after lunch) but for the most part it was a really great 3D show.

We wanted to see the Hunchback of Notre Dame, but it was closed. Instead, we got in line for the Backlot Tour. Now, if you have been on the one at Universal Studios (I’ve been to the one in LA), don’t even try to compare the two. Universal’s is much more in depth and entertaining. But this one is good too, just on a much smaller scale.

After that, we played on the Honey I Shrunk the Kids Playground. I have a bit of a personal story about this. I remember when MGM Studios first opened; they were advertising this playground on TV. I must have been between about 10 years old. I remember seeing the pictures of it and thinking “That looks so cool, I really want to go to Disneyworld to do that!” Alas, I never got to go. Until now! Being able to slide down the roll of Kodak film really was a dream come true for me.

Next we headed down Mickey Avenue for Who Wants to Be a Millionaire. We loved this! Neither of us made it to the hot seat (or even close) but it was still very fun. Again, I think it’s something that would definitely bore small kids. From there was parked in front of Sorcerer Mickey’s Hat to get a spot for the parade. After the parade, we went in to see The Voyage of the Little Mermaid. Tony had a thing for Ariel and was disappointed that they didn’t sing “Kiss The Girl.” But otherwise, it’s a really cool (yet short) version of the movie.

By now I realize that I have missed the last showing of Beauty and the Beast, which I really wanted to see. Oh well, more reason to come back! We headed to the Hollywood Hotel for the Tower of Terror. This ride is awesome! For those who may be scared, try to summon up your courage and do it. My favorite part isn’t even the drops, but when you are in the elevator car and enter that really creepy Twilight Zone level. That was awesome.

It was raining when we got back outside, so we hustled over to Rock’n Roller coaster. Now, I am a rollercoatser junkie, so I definitely have to deal with the fact that this is the only “good” coaster in all of Disneyworld. I thought it was fun, though I must say my local Six Flags has far better.

After that we walked all the way back for the Great Movie Ride. This is a nice mellow experience, but don’t get your hopes up too much. It’s “okay.” By this time, it was time to hustle over to the Fantasmic Theater. We got there at 7:45 and I was really nervous cause I know people camp out at starting at 7:00. We ended up all the way on the left side in the Beast (I think) section. The seats weren’t as bad as I thought. The way the show goes, there isn’t really a bad seat in the place. That is, unless you end up downwind and all the smoke from the fireworks chokes you to death. Needless to say, this show is awesome. We loved it.

After that we made our way back to the busses. We were on a bus within 20 minutes of getting to the bus stop and were back at POR in no time.

Day Four: (Our first Anniversary) Animal Kingdom and Magic Kingdom
Up at 7am and were at the Animal Kingdom in time for the 9am opening. Instantly Tony was blown away by the landscaping and spent most of the day oohing and ahhing at the beauty of this park. I must agree, this place it really cool. I think it’s safe to say it was our favorite. Throughout the say we spent a lot of time just walking around and taking it all in. We started out by heading straight for Africa and the Kilimanjaro safari. But first, we stopped in Africa while I played instruments with the street musician. We really enjoyed the safari, and liked that we got there early; the animals were all out and active. After that we went on the Train ride to Rafiki’s Planet watch. I definitely recommend this; we spent almost an hour there. It’s great if you or your kids are into science and nature. Plus the petting zoo is cool.

After that we headed to Asia for Kali River Rapids. We wore ponchos and still got soaked! This is a fun ride, though I thought it was too short. From there we walked the Maharajah Jungle Trek. I loved those bats! We were then hungry, so it was off to Pizzafari (on the other side of the park) for lunch. I must say, for counter service, this place is awesome. Good food and great dining facilities. We then went to see It’s Tough to be a Bug. Also a great show, one of the highlights. Some of the little kids did get really scared though. I love the end when the bugs all scurry back (and under your seat!). Next was Dinosaur. This was better than both Tony or I expected. I was expecting another “slow dark ride” but this was really exciting.

We raced over for the last Tarzan show. Unlike a lot of the others, this is not a short version of the movie, just a rock-style concert with the songs from the movie. It was good though. I would skip it if pressed for time. After that we hiked all the way over to the Festival of the Lion King, which I loved. Like Tarzan, this is also concert of the movie’s songs, but I think little kids got into this one much more (I certainly did).

With that, we had done most of the attractions. The Animal Kingdom is great, but when crowds are low, by 3:30pm we had covered just about everything. This is good park to do if you plan to go to see a night show at another park in that same day.

We went back to POR to rest and change. We had 6pm reservations at ‘Ohana for our anniversary. We took a bus to the Magic Kingdom and then monorailed to the Polynesian. We got a great seat right by the window; we could see Cinderella’s Castle across the lagoon. And the food was awesome! Our server gave us a cupcake for our anniversary. We were both so stuffed when we left. We took the monorail back to the Magic Kingdom for SpectroMagic and Fantasy in the Sky. We didn’t get there until 7:45 (for an 8pm parade) and the place was shoulder-to-shoulder people. Still, Tony and I managed to worm our way back to Liberty Square, where got a really great viewpoint for the parade. This was Tony’s first time in the Magic Kingdom, and I loved that his first view of it was at night. We got some great shots of the parade with the castle in the background. We were standing in front of a Disney Christmas Shop across from the Hall of the Presidents. This was not such a great view of the fireworks though, they were hidden behind some trees.

After the parade, the park was a sea of people trying to exit. I wanted to just hang tight, but Tony was determined to tackle the crowd. The wait for the busses was horrendous, but we expected that. We just had a seat and waited until the lines slimmed down. POR and POFQ had two separate busses, so we decided to take the POFQ bus (which had much shorter lines) and walk back to our room at POR. That was a great idea. The bus driver sang to us as we pulled into the resort. He sang the ending of the Mickey Mouse Club song and the whole bus joined in. It was a really magical ending to our first anniversary.

Day Five: More Magic Kingdom
We were at the Magic Kingdom at about 9:30 am. By this time in out trip, we are both a bit drained. It was on this day that I wish we’d planned a day for rest instead of just going non-stop each day. I don’t think we enjoyed the Magic Kingdom as much as we could have; we both wanted to just get it done so we could go back to the room. We only did about half of the attractions here, though we did hit all the major ones.

Tony was determined to use Fastpass, but because it was September the lines were so short it wasn’t necessary. We started the day in Tomorrowland and we spent 20 minutes trying to figure out what to do first. We ended up with Space Mountain, which we both thought was fun, even though not really thrilling. It’s a classic though. Next was Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin. This was too much fun! I wished we’d done it twice, it was just that awesome! Tony’s score was around 600,00 and mine was only 20,000. Needless to say, he gloated all day. After that we did Alien Encounter. I thought it was definitely scary. Tony said there was too much build up, too many people telling him how scary it was, that he didn’t really get scared. We did the Tomorrowland Speedway and then left Tomorrowland for Liberty Square.

I have wanted to see Hall of the Presidents since I first heard about it. I am a big history buff and was just blown away by this, though I think Tony caught some Zzzz’s in this show. After that we did the Haunted Mansion. It’s corny, but cute. Another classic. It was almost lunchtime, but we had to stop by it’s a small world on the way. Again, very corny, but it’s a classic. And just typing that has put that infectious song in my head Stop it! Stop it! Aaah, I can’t get it out! It’s a small world after all, It’s a small world after all, It’s a small world after all, it’s a small, small world! Now, in German…

Okay, now for Cindy’s! It was only 2:00, and out reservation was for 2:30, but not only did they seat us, we got the best seat in the house! We were right center of the room in front of the window. I was eating in Cinderella’s castle! How cool!! I was under the impression that the restaurant faced Main Street, but it faces Fantasyland. We got to watch a boy pull the sword out of the stone.

We made it out of lunch just in time for the Share a Dream Come True Parade. We watched it from in the doorway of an air-conditioned store. Tony then spent some time at the Frontierland Shooting Arcade. I sat waiting with a mother who was waiting for her son. My Tony and her son both came back to us at the same time to ask for more quarters. It was a really cute moment. I was out, so we headed for the Country Bear Jamboree. Tony loved it, was my turn to get some Zzzz’s. Not to say it was boring, but I was just tired. We got a Fastpass for Big Thunder Mountain (Yay, we got to use Fastpass!) and we got in line for Splash Mountain. Both were enjoyable, and I didn’t realize that Splash Mountain was such a long ride.

From there we entered Adventureland and got on Pirates of the Caribbean. There was absolutely no one else in line and no one else in our boat. Another cheesy ride, but a classic. We saw the Enchanted Tiki Room show, which was more enjoyable than I thought it would be. We did the Jungle cruise, which is not recommended after going to the Animal Kingdom and doing the Safari. It’s hard to enjoy animal statues after seeing the real things. It started to rain while on the ride, which made it really cool. It felt like being in a real Jungle.

Next was one of Tony’s favorites, the Swiss Family Treehouse. This is not a ride, but a really cool walkthrough. For anyone who dreamed of having, or had, a treehouse as a kid, this is awesome. We got some great views of the castle from the top. After that, we were pretty pooped. We headed for the busses and back to POR by about 5pm.

The plan for the day was to go to Downtown Disney for the evening, but both of us were too tired, and Tony needed some laundry done. So, we ordered pizza, watched TV and did our laundry the rest of the evening.

Day Six: Blizzard beach and Downtown Disney
The initial plan was to get up and do half of the day at Blizzard Beach, the other half at Typhoon Lagooon. That didn’t happen. We got up on time, but watched two Lifetime Movie Network movies. We didn’t get to Blizzard beach until about 11am. It rained most of the day, but that was okay cause we were getting wet anyway. We really enjoyed the water park and did just about everything there. We spent a lot of time on Cross Country Creek (I even fell asleep it was so relaxing). We both did Summit Plummet. Now, I am not afraid of thrill rides, but I did not really enjoy this one. It was great going down, it feels like a freefall and you are going really fast. But once you hit the bottom, the force is really hard. It really hurt hitting the bottom. I saw a little girl crying her eyes out because of that. Tony and I loved Teamboat Springs, the family raft ride, and we did that twice. We also did Runnoff Rapids, another water slide. Tony had his glasses around his neck on a string. At the bottom of the slide his tube flipped over and he went headfirst underwater. When he stood up, sure enough, his glasses were gone. The CM had to call in a diver to go underwater to find them, but he found them in no time (including someone elses).

We stayed at Blizzard Beach until about 4:30pm. We got back to POR, showered, and took the boat to Downtown Disney. We had dinner at the House of Blues. We went to DisneyQuest, which we both loved. Looking back, I wish we’d allocated more time for this. It was really awesome. Our favorite part just might have been the classic arcade games (no quarters needed!). Neither one of us was too big in the two virtual reality games, but we did really like the Buzz Lightyear game a lot.

After that, we went back over to Pleasure Island. This time, we went to the Adventurers Club (but didn’t stay long) and the Comedy Club. It’s a improv “Whose line is it anyway” style club, but very clean. We enjoyed ourselves here a lot.

After that, we headed to the boat launch to go back to POR. That was our last night at Disney :(

Day Seven: Downtown Disney and Departure
Tony wanted to sleep in, but I wanted to make the most of our final Disney hours. I got up early and took a photo tour of the resort while he got dressed. We called Bell Services and had our bags held. YourRide transportation wasn’t due to pick us up until 4:00pm. We hopped on a bus around 9:30 to Downtown Disney to do some shopping and more DisneyQuest. When we got there, DisneyQuest wasn’t open just yet, so we did some window-shopping. We spent a few hours at DisneyQuest re-doing the things we’d enjoyed from the night before. We had lunch at Wolfgang Puck Express. We did some souvenir shopping and mulling around. I could have spent forever shopping, especially at the Disney Home and Christmas stores. We spent a lot of time (and money) at the World of Disney. By 3:00 we were at the bus stop to go back to POR, one last time. When we got to the resort, we mauled around the lobby area (I picked up brochures for scrabbooking). Rabbit was there by 4:00 and it was off to the airport and back to the real world :(

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